Chicken Nuggets

 I got a new pair of lady pants! And no, they're not tight pants.

Canby got a new Marshalls, and I've always been more of a Ross girl, but Wendy said we needed to hit the Marshalls and boy was she right. Had I saved anything for my children or retirement, I could lose it all in that store. I wonder if they're like Ross in that some are better than others, and maybe this one is so great because it's new. Doesn't matter, they had great pants and I bought a pair. Have I worn them yet you may ask... No. I have not. But I have pants that fit me, folded up in a drawer to pull out in case the appropriate fashion moment arises. Until then, you'll find me content in my leggings.

My new ice maker came yesterday. I don't love it. I don't hate it, but I don't love it either. It's loud and it's not my old one which I know sounds obvious and dumb, but I loved my old one and this one is different. Oh well, I'm back in the nuggets. This one is smaller and doesn't take up as much space on the counter which is a big +, I just wish it could have been just like my other one which was also loud, but a different loud. They don't make my old one anymore though so I need to just get over it and chill out.

Katie is growing so fast and still not walking very well. I'm going to call the vet on Monday and see if maybe she needs another round of antibiotics. I'm almost wondering if what we thought she had may have morphed into joint ill and could be treated with antibiotics and anti-inflammatory meds. there was such a dramatic improvement after her first vet visit and that was the initial treatment. I have her on B, E and A vitamins and I know it's helping, but I need see if we can get her to where she can stand on her own. If not, I'll just have a wooly wheelbarrow scooting around the house.

Let's talk for a minute about showering with a sheep. Have you done it? I never thought I would be one of those people who showers with sheep, but here I am, so let's break this down.

1. Taking a shower with a sheep is easier than washing a sheep in the sink or the tub. Less bending and stooping

2. Taking a shower with a sheep is better than washing your sheep outside with the hose when its 40 degrees outside. I think the hose is obviously your best bet during the summer months or if you live somewhere with a warm year round climate.

3. Taking a shower with a sheep really isn't that much different than showering alone until its time to clean the wool out of the drain.

However you choose to wash your sheep, just make sure you stay ahead of it, no one likes a smelly sheep.

The eggs are still marinating but I'm starting to have anxiety about hatching all roosters.

New Nuggets

 Hi. I'm Marilyn. I'm addicted to nugget ice. I was off the ice for almost five days after a traumatic failure to restart after the last cleaning. I was sure it would come back to life after a time-out in the dark hallway. False. Luckily, Macy's was celebrating our presidents yesterday and has been thoughtful enough to extend me a tempting line of credit that I used to fund my shameless need for the nuggets. So, in four to six business days all will be right in my world again. 

The drain parts came for the tub and it's a pain in the ass but doable. I also decided to put the drain in the dark for a while because adjusting the height was making my brain hurt so I'll get back to that later.

I'm on a mission today to buy some legit lady pants. I have been strictly leggings circa 1986 for the last two+ years and its been an absolute joy, but it's time. I hate waistbands, but I also dislike the feeling of wearing what basically amounts to tights with the mandatory ass covering tunic. If you've known me long enough, you may remember the leggings intervention that was held in my honor in the very early 2000's. Those were dark days, and I actually ended up in overalls for a period of time. Again, I have a thing about waistbands. And underwire bras.

I'm chick ready. I went to TS last weekend and bought all the new required chicken equipment and have it ready to go in the bathroom/soap room/brooding room. Obviously nothing much has changed since the last time I set up a brooder fifteenish years ago, I guess chicken tech moves at a pretty slow pace. I think my official hatch date is March 4th, but chicken math is different than regular math. I think it's similar to cat math. I'll take the turner out on the 1st just to be safe.

Katie had a huge burst of energy yesterday and was scooting all over. I really think its because she's on creep and getting her minerals at will now. She's drinking water out of her bowl and down to just three good size bottles a day. If she could just stand on her own, she'd have it made! We'll get there, I'm confident.

Listen to this... One of Wyatt's friends made him chocolate covered cherry rice krispie treats for his birthday. Regular RKT recipe, add a box of cherry Jell-O and melt some chocolate over the top. OMG, they are AMAZING. Here's a recipe I found, but obviously I don't need to tell you to increase the butter and marshmallows. We're all adults here and know how to make a proper RKT.

Smells Like Grandpa

 Do you ever look at people your age and think, do I look that old? And then, do you ever wonder if people your age look at you and think, I hope I don't look that old. Getting old blows because my brain still thinks I'm 24, but my brain is old and unreliable. Anyway, moving on...

I've always been a Mac person and having to learn windows is still a huge issue for me. Especially Windows on a Laptop when it doesn't predict what I'm thinking or struggling to spell. Or punctuation. Or capitalization. I really thought we were past the point of what I attempted to learn in Mrs Marsden's typing class in 1982. My iMac is past the point of updates and that makes me so sad. I keep it around because I'm sentimental and refuse to let go. That iMac holds a lot of memories. Another thing I refuse to let go of is my non-working nugget ice maker. I took it off the counter and put it in the hall next to the garage in hope that it will heal itself. I've always said the two things I couldn't live without after having them is my Roomba and my nugget ice, but here I am not using my Roomba because it bumps into Katie and I can't afford a new nugget ice machine because, Katie. 

Speaking of Katie, she's on real food now along with her milk replacer, loose minerals and Nutri-Drench twice a week

Her wheelbarrow stance is strong, and her walk is improving, she just can't get into a standing position on her own. Wyatt thinks I should rig up a sling over the treadmill so she can get her steps in and build her strength up. Might not be a bad idea.

Wyatt turned 26 yesterday and that's all I have to say about that 😩

Pine tar. Thoughts? Does it smell like your Grandpa? Would you use a pine tar soap? Because I'm going to make it and I'm just wondering if anyone will want it. No one I've talked to has said "Oh wow! Great, I love pine tar". I'll let you know how it goes, but it'll be a while because I had to order it. Pine tar must not be in real high demand these days, the feed store doesn't even carry it.

Ew. Snow.

 We don't get too much snow, but even a little is too much. Thursday we got a little, Friday we got more and it was gross. No, I didn't have anywhere to go and no I didn't need anything, but I just don't like it. And, what happened to Oregon winter in November, December and January? What's with this snow in February March and April BS? Let me tell you what this stupid weather forced me to do, watch Adventures With a Purpose, that's what it forced me to do. It's a YouTube show about local Oregon guys who travel all over and pull "lost" people out of the water. Kind of like Jacque Cousteau Cold Case Files without the octopi and sharks. I don't know if it's super sad or super uplifting, but you're for sure happy for the families that get a sense of closure and also a little bit angry that it took a team of wet suit do gooders to solve the case.

I also made a few batches of soap. One batch for all you dried up itchy winter people with honey, oatmeal, yogurt and coconut milk (unscented of course), and another batch of my normal recipe scented with peach and poppy. I used to make cold process soap, but now I make hot process. The tops aren't as pretty, but I have more ability to add more ingredients and be more flexible with the amounts of oils I use. It also holds the scent better without the risk of acceleration. It goes through the saponification process while its cooking so the cure is just waiting for it to really harden up (that's what she said).

The drain in my bathtub has been broken for years. Between episodes of  AWP, I YouTubed how to fix it and was able to take it apart and order the new part. I'll put it back together when the stuff gets here on Monday and then we'll have a working tub again! I was forced into this because Katie is outgrowing the sink already and I think being in the tub is good therapy for her. Here's a derpy picture of her from yesterday morning. I can't even tell you how many pictures I have of her licking her lips like this.

I have a busy day today so I have to cut this short, but next time I'm going to talk about Walmart grocery delivery and how it changed my life

Sheep Jesus

 It's so cold here this morning. Not like really cold like it is in other places in the country right now, but pretty cold. In case you don't know, have never been here, or don't remember, our house is an old barn, and by old barn I don't mean rolling meadow romcom barn, I mean old poultry barn full of chickens kind of barn. It's basically like a giant 1960's double wide with minimal insulation and single pane windows. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't want to live anywhere else, but when its cold or hot outside, its cold and hot inside too. During the summer we have one window, in the back bedroom we can put an ac unit in, and in the winter we heat with a pellet stove that kind of keeps things warm. Our utility company, PGE here in the Portland area is making it pretty difficult to keep the lights on, and there's NO way we can afford to use the baseboard heat which was the norm when the house was built. I looked into solar, but I'd have to Craigslist a kidney in order to go that route, so we layer and make the best of it. Keeping a dog on your lap is also a pretty green solution to the problem. We keep our dogs fat and our legs warm.

I started Katie on some loose minerals a few days ago and I've convinced myself it's helping (I don't know if it actually is). I have been doing a lot of reading on White Muscle Disease and with the help of our amazing vets at Eagle Fern Equine in Estacada I think we're making good progress. White Muscle is the equivalent to muscular dystrophy and I don't think she will ever have full mobility, but I do want her to have quality of life. Besides the "physical therapy" she gets throughout the day, I also push her to be as independent as possible, so she scoots, crawls and pulls herself around the house. She's unable to get herself to a standing position, but once we get her up she can hobble around to where she needs to go. Every time I see her struggle I get so angry with that flat earth farmer for not making sure his pregnant ewes received the proper nutrition they needed, and feel its so unfair that she is the one who will suffer for it. I drive by his farm and see a pasture full of healthy lambs and I'm so glad that they're ok, but also wonder how many aren't or that didn't make it. Katie has had the selenium and vitamin E supplements that were required for treatment and the rest is up to sheep Jesus I guess.

Speaking of sheep Jesus, or just Jesus in general reminds me that today is the day that Jack Swafford, AKA husband # 4 and #5 went to be with Jesus. It was for the best, he had some very difficult last few years, and it definitely prevented him from becoming #7, but its a hard day for Wyatt. So tonight we will remember him with pan fried oysters and a half gallon of vodka. Just kidding about the vodka lol.

The eggs came yesterday!! I'm so ridiculously excited about these eggs. I have all their names picked out and decided if I end up with roosters, they will need to identify as hens because I couldn't land on any strong boy names. I'll keep working on it though just in case. Watch, I'll end up with eleven roosters and a hen that identifies as a rooster. Katie G said I should wait until they can tell me what pronouns they prefer, but I'm not having a bunch of Zenith and Moonshines in the coop. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Oh! I finished the big bathroom yesterday and its now my official soap and brooding room! What? Doesn't everyone have a soap and brooding room? No chicks in the tub though, you only make that mistake once.

Here's an Idea

 Lets talk about raised garden beds. Thoughts? That way I wouldn't have to till up a big space and I could just fence around each individual bed. I would put something down between the beds so I wouldn't have problems with weeds, which would mean less time weeding overall and the garden has to be fenced because of the incoming chickens and of course the deer, so that would mean less fencing and no posts. I have a barn full of scrap wood and all the corrugated tin roofing that has blown off the top of the barn. I think this might be one of my better ideas, and I think I can do a pretty poor job of it myself without having to ask a bunch of people to help me which is always a bonus. I think I'm going to do it. I'm not a gardener so I could be totally delusional about this, but right now the way it's sitting in my brain it's a great idea.

I'm still working on the big bathroom. There is SO much stuff in there, it's ridiculous. Sunday afternoon I found one of my Grammy's old wigs shoved in the back of one of the cupboards, so of course I stuffed it with a hand towel and took it upstairs and laid it on Wyatt's pillow, threw a blanket over the other pillows to look like a body and turned on a low light. Unfortunately the Benadryl I took at bedtime kicked in before Wyatt got home and started crying out in fear, but his reenactment of the event the next morning was pretty satisfying. I think my Grammy would have thought it was pretty funny too, especially since she doesn't use it anymore so I wasn't messing up her "good" hair.

So far, I have taken out THREE lawn and garden bags of clothes that don't fit. I'm not a big clothes shopper, I'm a big clothes collector. Every time someone else cleans out their closet I beg for the cast offs and what I end up with is clothes mountain. I've gotten some really great stuff over the years, but believe me when I tell you, there's a lot of it and now its all in my car ready to drive around for a month or two. That's not really true. There's not enough room in my car for me, the clothes and Katie, so I'll have to drop them off soon. My car wasn't really designed to carry sheep as passengers so I'm already kind of pushing it.

 I'm assuming this will be us one day and It gives me comfort that somewhere out there is another middle age woman wearing sensible shoes driving around with a sheep in her Fiat.

Ok, I've got stuff to do so that's enough for now.

Sunday Stuff

The incubator came yesterday! 

I can’t wait to fill it with those gorgeous eggs. I’ve never hatched eggs before but this year I feel very strongly about getting chicks from a local reputable farm. I found Red Dog Ranch here in Oregon and she had just what I was looking for. Did you know you can also have chicks shipped via USP? Well, don’t do it, and if you do, don’t tell me.

Katie Update

Katie is plugging along getting a little stronger every day. She’s getting much more vocal and is really good about telling me when she needs to eat and potty (she won’t potty laying down so I need to get her on her feet). I guess one could go so far as to say she’s potty trained me. She’s gaining weight super fast though, so she better figure out how to use those legs before I’m having to lift a 70lb wooly sack of potatoes.

Soap

Today is not only a soap making day, its also a soap room day. I've run out of space in the utility room, so its time to take over another space which of course means spending the rest of my day cleaning, organizing and moving sh!t. Honestly, I wouldn't mind replacing laundry with soap stuff but I don't think that's practical. Todays scent is baby themed, no not for Katie, for the human little's in my life. If you know a baby or have a baby that you want to smell like its been rubbed up with baby stuff  but in an all natural gentle *organic way, hit me up.

Blog

This blog is going to drive me to drink. Kind of like cleaning the oven. IYKYK. I have a custom domain for it and in my old life knew exactly how to change the code and presto chango, it was done. I don't know if Blogger changed or my brain melted, but I'm struggling. Also, my iMac got old while I've been gone and is no longer able to function in this new modern world so I hijacked Wyatt's laptop and it's NOT a Mac and that's really twisting my brain. Whatever, I'll figure it out. Be patient with me.

Whats New?

 It's only been thirteen years, anything new? I know, I know that seems like a really long time. I used to be Fat Bottom Farm, but a lot has changed. For one, my bottom isn't fat any more, and two it's not much of a farm anymore.

Here's a quick rundown. I got a divorce, had a couple heart attacks, downsized the farm, went back to work, had a small stroke, semi-retired, decided to start "farming" again but on a much smaller scale and here I am! We can get into all the details later.

Wendy is 40 now and still happily with Jesse, my grandson Hunter is a kick ass 13 year old football player and Wyatt is going to be 26 this month, thankfully still on the farm with me and working in the grocery business.

We have a new (new you you, not so much to us) pac of dogs, Mabel June a short tempered Chihuahua and Juan Pablo the ever loyal Black Mouth Cur straight off the mean streets of Mexico. Did you see the movie Twins with Danny DeVito and Arnold Schwarzenegger? That's them.

I only have two of my original sheep left, Jack the donkey is 25 now and sadly we just lost Pearl the pig last fall. That was a tough one.

Oh, and my Mom died.

On a brighter note, we have Katie the orphan lamb who came from the flat earth farmer down the road. She's short sighted in one eye and is having mobility issues but gets living room physical therapy throughout the day. That topped with tons of love seems to be working wonders and she is getting stronger every day!

I ordered 12 hatching eggs today. I figured with the price of eggs its worth it to put a coop together, buy all the new supplies since its been over ten years and the old stuff is lost in the ether and start over. I am hoping to have enough eggs to sell, and at this rate, with enough eggs, maybe I can finally take that dream vacation! I ordered brown, moss and olive eggs so it will be a nice assortment of chicks. My neighbor is going to help with construction, so it should come together pretty quick and then we wait...

Ok, that's probably enough for now, I don't want to overwhelm you with my thrilling life.

Good to see you again.

I'm aching Acres now because that's the original name of the farm. OG circa 1965, and a loving nod to our grandparents Ken and Florene. xoxo